


Possession (A Distorted Dream)

by ChiaRoseKuro



Category: Naruto
Genre: Alternate Universe - Supernatural Elements, Angst, Attempt at Hurt/Comfort, Author Chose Not to Tag Everything, Canon-Typical Violence, Forests, Getting Together Unconventionally, Gift Exchange, M/M, Mentions of kidnapping, Mistaken Identity, Mystery, Paranormal Investigators, Songfic, Suspense, Unreliable Narrator
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-04
Updated: 2019-11-04
Packaged: 2021-01-22 21:30:58
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,253
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21308920
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ChiaRoseKuro/pseuds/ChiaRoseKuro
Summary: When Naruto gets called back to his hometown for a kidnapping case, it seems straightforward enough - check for supernatural activity around the forest, find the missing children, and make sure it doesn't happen again. It's a little strange that his childhood friend would call a paranormal investigator for something a detective would normally do, but... it's been years since he's been back, and it seems like an innocent enough job. So what if it's a little strange? Missing children were just as worthwhile as haunted houses, after all -But it's not missing children Naruto ends up finding in a dark forest clearing. No, what he discovers instead is far greater than just missing children - and it's going to turn his world upside down.(wherein Naruto goes searching for the supernatural and ends up being found by them instead)
Relationships: Haruno Sakura & Uchiha Itachi & Uchiha Sasuke, Haruno Sakura & Uchiha Sasuke, Haruno Sakura & Uzumaki Naruto, Uchiha Itachi & Uchiha Sasuke, Uchiha Sasuke/Uzumaki Naruto
Comments: 6
Kudos: 35





	Possession (A Distorted Dream)

**Author's Note:**

> Once again, I have found myself doing far too much world-building for what should be a simple exchange gift - and instead of writing plotless NSFW shenanigans, this is pretty much just plot and angst instead. In the interest of not spoiling the story, I've chosen to leave off a few tags... but if you're not one for canon-typical violence, a bit of psychological mindfuckery, quite a number of human-skinned monsters and the usual amount of insulting that goes on between Naruto and Sasuke in canon, then this is most probably not the story for you. As always, the 'back' button is at your disposal, and you should make full use of it if you're considering leaving a rude comment (that will be summarily tossed into the shadows instead).
> 
> Special thanks to [Astra](https://lunanovakat.tumblr.com/) for providing the main characters (Naruto, Sasuke and Sakura), the pairing (SasuNaru, because I couldn't swing SasuNaruSaku in this one), a few key words to inform the plot (forest, supernatural, eerie and unearth, as well as monsters and suspense) and the genre (thrilling, which I ended up interpreting as vaguely psychological instead), Yugami-P's _Alice Human Sacrifice_ for inspiring the title and the broad theme of this story, and both [Kat](https://archiveofourown.org/users/blackkat/) (for hosting this on her Discord server) and [Sloaners](https://archiveofourown.org/users/beetlebee/) (for organizing the exchange). I had a blast writing this, even if mystery isn't really a genre I write for (though I absolutely love reading it), so I'm really grateful for the chance to try my hand at this.

* * *

“So _this_ is the place?” Naruto asks, scratching the back of his head as he glances at the rough dirt track stretching into darkness. “Sure doesn’t look like much, does it?” he adds underneath his breath—

But then, when did any of the supposedly _haunted_ places ever _seem_ to be much of _anything_, really? If it isn’t abandoned then it’s dilapidated, as though it was a _prerequisite_ for haunted places to be structurally unsound or a few hundred years out of date—and for all that the path is still there, it’s really _not_ much to look at.

If this had been the last guy to hire him then he might’ve gotten a sarcastic response back—but because the person who practically strong-armed him into the job is a _violent harpy_, Naruto gets an affectionate fist to the head for his troubles. “Look, Naruto,” Sakura sighs over his pained whimper, “I _know_ you fancy yourself to be a real-life ghostbuster now—”

“_Paranormal investigator,_ Sakura, I actually deal with _legitimate_ supernatural cases!” Naruto protests.

“—_but_ nobody’s really been able to do anything about this neck of the woods,” Sakura continues as though Naruto hadn’t spoken at all, “and nobody wants to come to a place where their children keep disappearing. If you’re the real deal then this should be easy for you to investigate and clear up, right?”

There’s a single, fleeting moment when Naruto opens his mouth, something along the lines of _maybe they keep disappearing because **you** scare them off_—but all it takes is one look at her beatific smile before he mutters, “I can’t believe I’m doing this as a _favour_ to you.”

“What, you want _payment_ for waving your sham equipment around?” Sakura scoffs. “Pout all you like at me,” she adds in a hard tone when Naruto unconsciously does just that, “but honestly, I keep telling everyone that there’s no such _thing_ as supernatural creatures. Why they decided to get _you_ onto the job instead of a private eye is just…”

Naruto feels like he should be offended by Sakura’s absolute lack of faith in his capabilities… but then, it was probably hard for a practicing doctor to believe in ghosts and other unnatural beings. Hell, if he hadn’t experienced _that_ during his gap year, _he_ might’ve been laughing at himself right now.

But with the memories of _that_ at the forefront of his mind and a copy of Shikamaru’s case notes clutched tightly in his hands, all Naruto does is offer another weak shrug and a desultory, “If you’re going to stand around and be rude, then you may as well stop wasting your time and head back.”

“And leave you alone to whatever’s responsible for all those kidnappings?” Sakura snaps—but when she places her hand on Naruto’s shoulder, it’s far gentler than it usually is. “I may not really _get_ your ghostbusting gig,” she quietly adds, “but if this is what it takes to find those children and make this area safe again, then I’ll do whatever it takes—_even_ if that means waving a thermometer around.”

“Oh my god, Sakura, I thought you _did_ medicine and knew how thermometers worked!” Naruto yells, but there’s a smile on his face all the same.

Because it’s clear that Sakura doesn’t really believe in his line of work. If anything, she’d made it _more_ than clear when he made it clear that he wasn’t going to college after all—but even after he’d opened his own one-man agency and began running around the countryside, she’d still call after large cases. She’d still visit, if only to scoff at his line of work and question the scientific validity of it all—

But she still _visited_, called _him_ for help instead of some other paranormal investigator with greater experience than him—and for all that she doesn’t believe in what he does, she’s not turning to head back into town, either.

“Who knows with you, honestly?” Sakura’s sniffing even now—but it’s not long before she begins heading off down the path, saying, “Now come _on, _I want to be home before dinner!”

And really, in the face of that…

“Keep talking loudly like that, and maybe you’ll _become_ dinner to something!” Naruto says right back, but there’s a smile lurking on his face all the same when he moves to follow her.  
  


* * *

  
The forest in Naruto’s memories was a dappled one, light dancing between the leaves and birdsong colouring the air no matter where he roamed—but the forest he’s walking through now is nothing like that, and it’s no accident that he’s practically walking on Sakura’s heels. It’s not that he’s _scared_ or anything that would earn Sakura’s ridicule if he ever admitted to it, but…

Haunted houses were scary because of all the random, inexplicable noises that’d echo throughout them. Erratically creaking floorboards, whistling winds through the unlikeliest of holes—Naruto’s been in and out of so many that he’d long stopped reacting to them with fear or trepidation. After all, most of them ended up being death traps that just needed a good demolition… and maybe an exorcism or two, if the monster residing there was particularly stubborn or malevolent.

But a forest completely devoid of birdsong or rustling leaves? A forest that seemed to echo hollowly with his and Sakura’s footsteps as they continued down the ever-fading dirt path?

“Be careful of the undergrowth,” Sakura suddenly says then, almost startling Naruto out of his skin with the unexpected sound. “It’s hard to see snakes or other animals when it’s this dark.”

And when it’s dark enough to feel like twilight, for all that there’s more than an hour until noon? “Yeah, you’re telling _me,_” Naruto mutters, and glances warily around the path as they continue along.

It’s not long before the path just about disappears into the undergrowth though—but Sakura’s steps are sure as she continues along, and Naruto only swallows as he follows behind her. “So, uh, you said there’s some sort of shack deeper in the woods?” he asks when the silence becomes too overbearing for him to take. “I don’t _remember_ anything like that around here,” he mutters, more to himself than Sakura, but there’s a faintly exasperated smile on her face when she stops and turns back to face him.

“Naruto,” Sakura sighs as she places her hands on her hips, “you don’t even remember where my house is, and I’ve lived there since I was a _baby_.” Rather than tease him further on the subject, though, she shakes her head and resumes walking again, adding, “Kiba hasn’t seen it for himself, but Akamaru has—and it doesn’t sound pretty either.”

There’s a moment when Naruto wants to probe a little further, maybe even suggest turning back to fetch Akamaru so they have a better idea of just _where_ this supposed shack is—but then he almost runs headlong into Sakura’s back. “What the hell?” he snaps instinctively, before he realizes just _who_ he’s talking to in that tone of voice—

But instead of bringing a fist down onto his head or injuring him in some other way, Sakura only scowls for a moment before turning back to whatever had stopped her in her tracks. It takes Naruto a moment to reorient himself and peer over her shoulder, mouth opening to iterate a politer version of his earlier question—but he closes it in the next second, because it’s very clearly a moot point.

When Sakura had mentioned a shack, Naruto had thought of a rotting old cabin in the middle of the woods, not—some hulking medieval mansion in the middle of a shadowed clearing. _How_ the clearing is this dark when there’s a good thirty feet between the trees and the so-called shack is a mystery to Naruto, and how Akamaru mistook this to be a shack is even _further_ beyond his comprehension…

Except, well, Akamaru’s a dog. There’d also been several children kidnapped in the past half-year, and it’d make sense for them to be kept in a large establishment if—_when_—he and Sakura found them, so maybe it’s not so strange after all.

Granted, there’s several things that’re wrong with the mansion—like its existence to begin with, for instance, and the incredible gloom of its pitch-black walls and roof—but where else would he begin to look for missing children?

_Yep, definitely doesn’t look pretty,_ Naruto finds himself thinking as he steps around Sakura and slings his rucksack off his shoulders, _but it’s a place to start, at least._  
  


* * *

  
It becomes clear, pretty much as soon as Naruto walks up to the doors, that it is far more than _just_ ‘a place’. It’d been intimidating enough from the edge of the clearing, what with the dark colouring and its rather imposing height—but there’s an honest-to-goodness _eyeball_ hanging in the middle of the otherwise-pitch door. A door that also happens to stretch _far_ above his head, at that, and when Naruto happens to be an even six foot?

_Seriously, how the **hell** is this place even standing?_ Naruto asks himself, if only to distract himself from the _eyeball tacked to the door._ It doesn’t help that it’s very clearly a _real_ eyeball too, shrivelled and brown from days of exposure, and the thought that this might belong to one of the children he’s trying to find is…

Well. It’s probably best not to think of the possibilities, even if Naruto’s seen his fair share of things over the years, and he steels himself before knocking on the door.

“What, do you really think someone _lives_ in there?” Sakura asks, brow arched sceptically—

But when the door unlocks with a rusty click, hinges squealing almost painfully as it swings open before them, Naruto shrugs and mutters, “Couldn’t hurt to try, could it?”

If he’d been expecting some sort of scruffy drunk or even someone vaguely insane, though…

“May I help you?” the person at the door asks in a low, smooth tone, and Naruto finds himself getting a discreet elbow to his ribs before he manages to snap himself out of it.

Because the man in front of him is dark-haired and pale in a way that Naruto’s never seen around here. Oh, he remembers Hinata and her family well enough—but _their_ sort of paleness was delicate in a way that _this_ man’s absolutely isn’t. It’s so pale, in fact, that it looks positively _ghostly_ beneath the dark spill of his low ponytail and his equally dark clothing, and Naruto can’t help staring at how _translucent_ it is even as he swallows around his dry throat.

“I,” Naruto begins croakily—but no other words come out, and Sakura sighs heavily before cuffing him over the head.

(he’ll find it strange, in hindsight, that Sakura’s so _composed_ around this stranger when she usually falls head over heels for _any_ remotely pretty man, but for now…)

“What this blockhead _means_ to say,” Sakura says, scowling at Naruto before turning a professionally bland smile on the man, “is that we’re here to investigate rumours of disappearing children in the vicinity. I’m sorry if this is all rather short notice, but could we trouble you for a few hours?”

“My brother and I are not in the habit of kidnapping children,” the man murmurs, cold beneath the quiet velvet of his voice. “Besides, I believe that you require a search warrant to investigate private property.”

“We’re not policemen!” Naruto manages to interject then—still a little croaky, but intelligible all the same. “We—well, _I_, I guess—think there might be supernatural forces at work, and when we heard there was a house out here—”

“You drew the conclusion, erroneous as it is, that we must be at fault,” the man smoothly finishes.

Now that he’s faced with someone in this not-shack calmly telling him off for trying to find any sign of ghosts or ghouls or something equally spooky, it’s… well, it’s _embarrassing_. To come here on hearsay alone, by the request of childhood friends he barely keeps in contact with anymore…

“Yeah, this was kinda dumb, huh?” Naruto laughs hollowly. “We’ll just, uh, go search elsewhere and see if we can find them,” he adds in a falsely chipper tone, turning to shake Sakura’s hand off and leave—

But then there’s a cool hand on his shoulder and a cooler, “Itachi, you’re _terrible_ at this.

“The point is to _keep_ him here, not drive him off by _acting realistically,_” that biting voice continues—but before Naruto can blink and turn back, let alone _think_ about opening his mouth to question the turn of events, there’s teeth whispering against his earlobe and a silky, “_Sleep, Naruto_.”

And though that’s the last thing he wants to do right now, with far too many questions whirling around in his head and a tickle in the back of his mind from how _familiar_ that voice sounds—his eyelids grow heavy, and it’s a matter of seconds before he slumps back into the person’s arms.  
  


* * *

  
“If you had just _listened_ to me, we could’ve resolved this _without_ using my compulsion on him,” are the first words Naruto becomes aware of. “Honestly, you’d think someone who advocates free will so much would _find_ a way to promote it—”

“Is it that time of month, little brother?” the smooth voice—_Itachi,_ Naruto’s foggy mind supplies—asks, and there’s a sound like cracking wood before Itachi murmurs, “Now, now, what have I said about controlling your violent impulses?”

“_Screw_ my violent impulses!” Itachi’s little brother snaps—

But as they continue bickering back and forth, Itachi’s faintly amused voice sliding through his little brother’s biting comments, Naruto tunes them out in favour of cataloguing his situation. Because as much as he _wants_ to tune in and understand the context behind all their words—like compulsion and free will, and _especially_ its connection to him—he can’t see anything. He’s also, from the way he can’t quite feel his hands, tied up a little too tightly for comfort.

And with what little he can remember about _how_ he got there emerging from the fog blanketing his mind…

“Keep whinging like little children at the top of your voices, why don’t you?” an all-too-familiar voice abruptly interjects, and Naruto can’t help the way he jerks in his restraints. “See, you’ve gone and woken him _up_,” Sakura continues huffily, shoes clicking on the floor as she moves towards Naruto.

“No, I’m fairly sure _you_ did,” Itachi’s little brother sighs—but with his other senses heightened from his loss of vision and with the memory of Itachi’s features clear in his mind, Naruto finds himself stilling almost against his will.

Because he _knows_ that voice—how could he not, when it features so prominently in his nightmares? The reason Naruto had given up on college to investigate the paranormal instead… the very person who had lingered in his mind like a malevolent wraith, biding his time until they met again…

It’s not until utter silence descends upon him that Naruto realizes he’s spoken Sasuke’s name aloud, but he barely has a moment to comprehend it before there’s a cry and a dull-sounding impact. “What have I _said_ about your violent impulses,” Itachi hisses—but all Naruto can concentrate on is the icy fingers curling around his chin.

“Leave us,” Sasuke says, nails digging into Naruto’s skin, but they don’t budge even as Sakura and Itachi offer up protests. “I’m going to show you _more_ than a little violence if you don’t leave _right now,_” he snarls over the top of them—and though there’s a moment when Naruto thinks they’ll continue regardless, it only takes another moment of silence before there’s footsteps fading away from him.

“Be careful, little brother,” is the rather befuddling comment Itachi leaves for Sasuke—but before Naruto can ponder over it, there’s the quiet _click_ of a shutting door. A squeal of a rusty bolt, a few heartbeats filled with nothing other than his own breathing, and then…

“Naruto,” Sasuke murmurs, “I’ve finally found you again.”

And for all that he should be scared in a situation like this, bound and blinded and at the mercy of the being who’d practically _made_ him into a paranormal investigator—Naruto’s never been one to stay passive, and this time’s no different. “Great, you’ve found me,” he replies, a little distorted around the fingers still digging into his chin. “Can you fucking let me go now? Or are you going to keep me locked up until I break through your stupid compulsions _again?_”

“Oh, Naruto,” Sasuke breathes, loosening his grip so he can caress Naruto’s cheek, “I thought we had an understanding, you and I, and I’d hate to think you’d forgotten all about it.

“Or do you need a reminder of who you belong to?” Sasuke hisses, ripping the blindfold off Naruto’s face and filling his vision with his spinning red eyes. “_I_ was the one who found you, _I’m_ the one who knows you better than anyone else does—”

“And _you’re_ a bastard who’s been kidnapping children and brainwashing my friends,” Naruto spits back, “so stop being such an utter _asshole_ and leave me _alone_ already!”

“No,” Sasuke says, cold and implacable. “All I’ve ever done was what I thought best for my precious people, but you don’t _understand_ that concept anymore. I thought you were meant to be _generous_, Naruto—or is that generosity of yours conditional?”

“When it comes to someone like you?” Naruto snarls, ignoring the twinge in his mind at Sasuke’s words in favour of leaning back in his chair. “Or maybe I should say—when it comes to _something_ like you,” he adds as Sasuke’s form ripples around the edges, “because I can’t use human metrics on someone who doesn’t treat other people like _humans_, can I?”

If this had been the same being he’d ran into all those years ago, Naruto would’ve likely gotten a hand clenching cruelly around his throat—but Sasuke only laughs, voice grating against Naruto’s ears like nails on a chalkboard, and presses closer to him again. “God, humans make me _sick,_” Sasuke says, “but it’s what they’ve done to _you_ that makes me sicker still.”

“Don’t tell me you’re going to show me those hallucinations again,” Naruto snorts, half-expecting Sasuke to take offence at that—

But when Sasuke flickers around the edges and the fingers still pressed against his cheek become colder still, when the next breath Naruto exhales comes out as a puff of mist…

“Deny it all you like, but I’m going to _make_ you understand the truth,” Sasuke hisses—and then there is only fire where frost had once been before everything goes dark once more.  
  


* * *

_  
You were happy with us, once._

The voice appears from nowhere—but no matter how Naruto turns in place, peering into the gloom, there’s nobody else around beyond himself. There’s only himself around a dying campfire, weakly flickering flames barely keeping the darkness at bay, and there’s no warning at all before he hears the voice again.

_When did it go wrong, Naruto? Sometimes I wonder if I drove you to this, but…_

It doesn’t sound like Sasuke at all, not in the memories that leered at him from the shadows—but the person who walks into the light and takes a seat beside him _is_ Sasuke. It’s the Sasuke he remembers befriending in his gap year, the one whose eyes always flickered red whenever he got a little too annoyed but who insulted him with a smile on his face, and Naruto’s fingers twitch by his side.

Because, really, what _did_ go wrong between them? Naruto remembers laughter amid the caustic remarks they’d fling at each other, smiles shared just after they’d gotten up to mischief together… but there’s only pain lancing through his chest as Sasuke’s slender fingers clench down on his own knees.

“It was all your fault,” Naruto croaks, tearing his gaze from Sasuke’s hands. Even when he hears Sasuke turn to him, gaze boring into the side of his face—he only stares into the flickering flames and says, “It would’ve been so much easier if you’d just stayed a handsome asshole, y’know?”

Instead of that hollow voice echoing in the emptiness, though, there’s a pale hand pressing gently against his shoulder and searing warmth seeping through the thin fabric of his shirt. “Tell me what you first remember,” Sasuke murmurs—

And though Naruto would ordinarily refuse, draw away and leave like he’d told Sasuke the first time he’d walked away—his hand is so _warm_ against his shoulder, and the puff of breath against his ear doesn’t give him chills down his spine. Or maybe it’s just that Naruto is tired—tired of chasing off shadows, tired of waking in a cold sweat in the middle of the night—but whatever it is, he brings a hand up to curl around Sasuke’s and turns to look him in the eyes.

“Do you mean what I remember about you?” Naruto asks. “Or do you mean—”

“Your very first memory,” Sasuke insists—and though it makes no sense, Naruto obligingly casts his mind back anyway.

Except…

“I remember bumping into you in a back alley,” Naruto mutters, gaze dropping to their overlapped hands. “I remember you calling out to me, but…”

“What about your home?” Sasuke asks. “Your friends, your parents?”

“I,” Naruto begins, brows furrowing as he casts his mind back, but—

Oh, there’s the _impression_ of his childhood, dappled sunlight in the leaves and laughter echoing across the glade. There’s half-remembered ghosts of laughter and flashes of faces, Sakura and Shikamaru and Kiba when they were all much, much younger. Naruto knows the name of his hometown, knows the name of the street where he grew up on and all the important facts…

But it’s only when fingers brush his cheeks that Naruto realizes he’s crying, silent tears dripping down his face as his hand trembles beneath Sasuke’s. “You brainwashed me too, didn’t you?” he manages to choke out somehow, shaking off Sasuke’s hands and almost reeling off his seat in his attempt to escape him. “Don’t pretend to be _nice_,” he spits out, “when you’ve fucked with my head as well—”

“It wasn’t _me_, Naruto,” Sasuke snaps, lunging forward to clench his hands around Naruto’s shoulders. “How many _fucking_ times do I have to tell you before you’ll believe me?!”

“None, because I _never_ will!” Naruto yells. “You’ve taken my memories and trapped me in here again, Sasuke—I don’t even know why you bother with making up such an elaborate fucking story—”

“Unless it’s the truth and you’re just _blinded_ to it!” Sasuke yells right back, and the loss of composure is so startling that Naruto _hears_ his teeth click shut when Sasuke glares at him. “Tell me, do you even _remember_ why you began hating me? Or is that just another memory you can’t conveniently recall?”

_Oh, I **remember **alright,_ Naruto wants to snap… but when he opens his mouth to say just that, nothing comes out. The reasons he wants to throw in Sasuke’s face, the memories that plague his nightmares and the tumultuous emotions underpinning them all—oh, they’re all _there_ in his mind, but they’re nothing more than nebulous thoughts. As soon as he goes to grasp one, they slip through his fingers.

“Naruto,” Sasuke says in a tone of voice that suggests it’s not the first time he’s saying his name, “_look_ at me.”

And when he raises his head to do just that…

A wealth of red spills into his vision, but it’s not until he raises a hand to finger it that Naruto sees it for what it is. “Naruto, _stay_ with me,” Sasuke says, but there’s the flash of black claws where Naruto _knows_ his _human_ nails should be.

_It’s another of Sasuke’s hallucinations,_ Naruto wants to say, but there’s a sound like shattering glass in the back of his head, and—

Sakura dancing through the trees, delicate vines tangling through her hair even as branches reached out from nearby trees to caress her face. Kiba’s face lengthening and thickening with fur at every full moon, lone howls echoing through the woods until others of his kind joined him. Shikamaru seeping into the shadows, barely bothering with the illusion of walking when the town was so well-suited to his preferred method of travel…

And Sasuke, form blurring between solid and translucent, with the stubs of black-feathered wings emerging from his back whenever he laughed or smiled a little too much. He doesn’t want to reach up and confirm the taunting voices in his head, doesn’t want to look back at all he’s done and all he’s forgotten—but for all that he doesn’t want to, his trembling fingers reach up and brush the broken horns jutting from his head.

_Demon,_ his mind supplies, _you were meant to protect them all, but you **failed**_.

“_Naruto!_” Sasuke screams, but Naruto’s screams are too loud for Sasuke’s to be heard above them.

_It wasn’t kidnapping,_ his mind tells him in the midst of it all, _they were your kind, but you forgot._

**_You_**_ aided in driving your kin from hearth and home because you’re a **failure**, _is the last accusing thought Naruto’s mind throws at him, and then—  
  


* * *

  
“Honestly, you’re a _Neanderthal,_” is the first comment Naruto wakes to this time, and there’s a sharp cluck of Sakura’s tongue before she snaps, “A bull in a china shop would have more finesse than your stupid graceless ass!”

“Fallen angel, dryad. Dryad, fallen angel,” Itachi murmurs, voice even more amused than it’d been before. “Now that we’ve explained the reason behind Sasuke’s gracelessness, though,” he adds, inflectionless again, “I do believe Naruto’s awake now.”

Before he can feel even a smidgen of hurt at Itachi’s betrayal—or even pretend at unconsciousness, however _that_ worked when he wasn’t aware of what he was like when unconscious—there’s hands curling into his shirt and fisting themselves into the fabric. “You _utter_ idiot,” Sakura hisses as Naruto cracks his eyes open, “if I’d known Sasuke was going to do that, I would’ve found _another_ way!”

“But would you really have turned down the opportunity to get him back faster?” Sasuke asks from where he’s leaning against the wall. When Naruto turns to him and they make eye contact, he holds Naruto’s gaze as he adds, “He’s back where he belongs. He’s with _us_ now.”

“What about my job though?” Naruto rasps, and ignores the glass of water Itachi nudges towards him. “All those people I displaced for the humans—oh god, if I’d attacked my _precious people_ and didn’t even _know_ it—”

“If you want to atone so badly, then _do_ what you promised all those years ago,” Sasuke bites out—and though he doesn’t offer an apology, his gaze isn’t as cold when he glides forward and rests his hand atop Naruto’s. “You remember now, don’t you?” he asks in a quieter voice, gaze boring into Naruto’s—

And this time, when the memories come to mind, there isn’t the lingering fog that’d prevented him from seeing them clearly before. Even as Sakura lets go of his shirt and steps back with another sharp huff, even as Itachi helps prop Naruto up and presses the glass of water to his lips—he _remembers_, can see the faint green of Sakura’s arms and the glow to Itachi’s and Sasuke’s skin in a way he couldn’t before, and the revelation causes him to draw a shuddering breath.

It’ll be strange to adapt, after years of thinking he was a human. He still doesn’t know who cursed him into forgetting his true form or allegiances, can feel an ache in his limbs that must’ve been from his unconscious attempts to suppress his demonic blood—but Naruto finds himself smiling all the same. It might be a little wan, but with tears pricking at Sakura’s eyes and just a touch of warmth to Itachi’s?

“I’ll do my best now that I’m back, believe it!” Naruto says as cheerfully as he can, and laughs even as Sasuke thwaps him upside the head for his words.  
  


* * *

  
“So what was that whole thing with the missing children about, anyway?” Naruto asks some time later, bare feet crunching on dead leaves as he follows Sasuke back down the dirt path. “I mean,” he adds when Sasuke neither turns back nor makes any other move to acknowledge his words, “those were some pretty detailed notes, y’know, and I’d actually heard of some of those names before—”

“You’ll beat yourself over the head with it if I told you, moron, so drop it,” Sasuke interjects, but his voice isn’t as sharp as it’d usually be when he’s insulting Naruto’s—well, _anything_ really. “I can _still_ hear you thinking,” he adds waspishly, turning when Naruto doesn’t respond to him—

But Naruto’s rooted in place, tugging at the dark red locks he’d inherited from his mother and which had been sealed beneath the same magic that’d tampered with his mind, because he remembers one of those names. Clearly remembers the same red hair they’d shared, the emotion he’d misinterpreted as animal hostility in Gaara’s eyes when Naruto had driven him out from an old stone quarry, and…

“They weren’t children at all,” Naruto whispers to himself, unaware of the way Sasuke stiffens. “It was because of me… and even after all that…”

“Look, you absolute blithering idiot, how many _times_ do I need to tell you to drop it?” Sasuke snaps then, and Naruto looks up from his hair to the sight of feathers bristling from his shoulders. “What can you do when you’re determined to wallow in self-pity?” he asks, reaching out to grip Naruto’s shoulder. “Stop being such a fucking defeatist—or are you some cheap imitation of that moron?”

It’s not quite concern, not in any normal sense, but with Sasuke touching him when Naruto had long forgotten what it was like to _have_ someone this close? Even if this is only some confused by-product of that mind-tampering magic, even if he’s wildly misinterpreting things—he stares into Sasuke’s flickering red eyes and finds himself unable to hold his gaze.

“What, you gonna go soft on me if I’m _not_ Naruto?” he tries to deflect with a laugh, bringing a hand up to squeeze Sasuke’s. “Maybe I should pretend to be a shapeshifter for a little bit of peace and quiet around here,” he jokes, shrugging Sasuke’s hand off even as he lowers his own back to his side—

But then there’s fingers twining with his own, lips fleetingly brushing against his, and Naruto’s left to splutter as Sasuke turns around. “Like you’d get rid of me _that_ easily again,” he says, as though he hadn’t just _kissed Naruto on the lips_—but when Naruto scrambles over to his side, there’s just the faintest upward curl to his lips.

_Maybe it won’t be so bad to try again,_ Naruto thinks to himself—and when they emerge from the path, fingers still intertwined, there’s a smile on Naruto’s lips too. It’s not perfect, not by a long shot, but with someone else by his side to rectify all the pain he’d caused all everyone?

“Hurry up, moron, or Sakura’s going to yell at the both of us for being late,” Sasuke mutters, and Naruto rolls his eyes good-naturedly enough before matching his stride to Sasuke’s.

**Author's Note:**

> For further author notes and other things related to this fic, feel free to check out my [blog](https://chiarosekuro.wordpress.com/). Alternately, potential prompts and other sorts of inspiration can be found on my [Tumblr](https://chroku-n.tumblr.com/) or [Twitter](https://twitter.com/chroku_n/) if that tickles your fancy instead - or, if you'd like your own shiny new oneshot, you can request one from me [here](https://chiarosekuro.wordpress.com/commissions/).


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